College basketball is a roller coaster of outcomes.

Tennessee basketball went from defeating the No. 3 team in the country that ended its season a year ago to letting Kansas steal victory from the jaws of defeat in less than 24 hours. That’s just the challenge that was presented for the Vols when they signed up for the million-dollar winning prize.

And that’s what head coach Rick Barnes is able to walk away from Las Vegas with, alongside being $200,000 richer.

“I think the positive is we know that we’ve got a chance to be a really good basketball team and play with any teams in the country,” Barnes said. “But I think the positive will be is how hard it is to compete every night.”

It’s not easy to walk into the arena and battle with Power Conference opponents for three consecutive nights. But that’s what Tennessee (7-1) did — and its fruits of the labor were dealt two wins to one loss, a defeat that held all signs pointing to a win when it took a 12-point second-half lead.

But it happened. And it happened because Tennessee shot 31.2% from the field and 16.7% from 3-point range in the second half. It had Nate Ament go without a field goal over the final 20 minutes, just after draining five shots on eight attempts for 14 points to open the night.

The Vols simply got away from their game plan when shots weren’t falling. After scoring 22 paint points in the first half, the Vols moved their approach to away from the basket. Just 10 paint points came from the remaining 20 minutes, and 12 shots from beyond the arc were produced — totaling 25 for the night.

“I told our post guys when they’re out there shooting jump shots, I’m sure Bill (Self) and his staff were sitting on the bench saying, ‘Good let them do it. Let him. We don’t want them in there,’” Barnes said.

Getting to the free-throw line is the straightforward solution that Barnes provided. Tennessee shot 17-for-22 from the charity stripe, compared to 26-for-30 on Kansas’ (6-2) side.

But what frustrates the Vols’ head man is that Kansas went into the double bonus with 4:32 left in the game. Tennessee only drew one more foul on the Jayhawks the remainder of the way.

“We should have been up around the 30 attempt mark if we would have driven the ball with authority the way we should have,” Barnes said.

Losses are bound to happen, though. Barnes admits that Kansas deserved to win the game based on how his squad closed out. That is the learning experience that comes with it.

“I know Kansas has respect for our program,” Barnes said. “I know that, and they came out, and again, second half I thought they out-competed us when it counted, and that’s the hardest thing to take when they’re doing things that we could have done. But I don’t want to take anything from them. It’s a compliment to them because I thought they deserved to win the game.”

Tennessee committed a season-low seven turnovers in the loss, two ticks down from nine against Houston the night prior — which had also set a season-low. That’s a positive, when the Vols entered the week averaging 14.6 turnovers per game, ranking in the bottom half of the country.

Jaylen Carey is also coming into his own. The Vanderbilt transfer big has gone for double-digit scoring efforts in back-to-back games, and put together a strong 11-point, 10-rebound game against Kansas when the other bigs struggled to crash the boards. Another constructive development from the tournament.

“This group of guys, a lot of them it’s the first time they’ve been together, and to win at this level and to be a highly ranked basketball team when you go on the road, people are going to give you their best shot to win a big game,” Barnes said.

And it will continue to heat up as nonconference play gets into the depth of the gauntlet. Tennessee will get its first true road experience when it heads to the Western side of the Empire State for a battle in the Carrier Dome with Syracuse on Dec. 2.